The Whole Duty of Man, According to the Law of Nature. Samuel Pufendorf

      The Translator having observed, in most of the Disputes wherewith the present Age is disquieted, frequent Appeals made, and that very properly, from Laws and Ordinances of a meaner Rank to the everlasting Law of Nature, gave himself the Pains to turn over several Writers on that Subject. He chanced, he thinks with great Reason, to entertain an Opinion, that this Author was the clearest, the fullest, and the most unprejudiced of any he met with: And hereupon, that he might the better possess himself of his Reasonings, he attempted to render the Work into Mother-Tongue, after he had first endeavoured to set several better Hands upon the Undertaking, who all for one Reason or other declined the Toil. He thought when ’twas done, it might be as acceptable to one or other to read it, as it had been to himself to translate it.

      Concerning the Author, ’tis enough to say, that he has surely had as great Regard paid him from Personages of the highest degree, as perhaps ever was given to the most learned of Men; having been invited from his Native Country, first by the Elector Palatine, to be Professor of the Law of Nature and Nations in the University of Heidelberg; then by the King of Sweden to honour his new rais’d Academy, by accepting the same Charge therein, and afterwards being admitted of the Council, and made Historiographer, both to the same King, and to his Electoral Highness of Brandenburgh, afterwards King of Prussia.

      Concerning this his Work, it is indeed only as it were an Epitome of the Author’s large Volume of The Law of Nature and Nations: But as this Epitome was made and published by himself, the Reader cannot be under any doubt, but that he has here the Quintessence of what is there deliver’d; what is par’d off being mostly Cases in the Civil Law, Refutations of other Authors, and some Notions too fine and unnecessary for a Manual. How good an Opinion the learned World has of this his Performance, is very evident from the many Editions there have been of it, not only in the Original Latin, but in the Modern Languages, publish’d in Sweden, Holland, France, Germany, and England.¹

      Since² the first Publication hereof in 1673, at Lunden, the Author revis’d his larger Work, and put out a new Edition of it, with many Additions and great Improvements; and from thence this Work also has been amended and enlarged, by extracting these additional Chapters, and inserting them as compendiously as might be into their proper Places; which was first done in a German Translation,³and afterwards in a Latin Edition, published by the Professor of Giessen,⁴both in the Life-time of the Author, with his Knowledge, and by his Approbation;⁵so that the Reader may be satisfied that these Additions, now first inserted into this Translation, are as genuine as the Rest of the Work; as he will find them as useful and necessary a Part, as any of the whole Book. Besides these, in this Impression, some other Additions and Alterations have been found necessary to be made: For whereas in some Places the Author’s Opinion was delivered in so brief or obscure a Manner, that his Meaning seemed difficult to be apprehended; again in other Places the Coherence and Connection of his Discourses did not sufficiently appear; to remedy the former of these Defects, all intricate Phrases and Expressions have been changed,⁶ and where even that was not sufficient to make the Author’s Mind plain and clear, it is explained and illustrated by adding proper Instances and Examples;⁷ and then to repair the latter Defect, the Order of some of the Sections hath been changed, and proper and necessary Transitions to many of them have been added;⁸ the taking which Liberty, ’tis to be hoped, will ever appear most justifiable, since thereby the Rules of Method are better observ’d, and the Sense of the Author rendered more perspicuous than in the former Editions of this Translation.

      But farther, to make this Edition still more compleat and useful than the former, to each Section References are continually made to the large Work of The Law of Nature and Nations,⁹and, as often as could be, to The Rights of War and Peace;¹⁰that those who read this Epitome, and have a mind to see any Point therein more fully handled and illustrated, may be readily directed, where to have recourse to the Place where it is at large discoursed of, not only by this Author himself, but also by Grotius, an Author of equal Reputation for his judicious and learned Writings on Subjects of the same nature. Besides these References, as some of the Author’s Opinions, laid down in this Treatise, have been controverted by some Writers, and defended by the Author in some other of his Works, the Reader is directed to those Places in them where these Cavils and Exceptions are taken notice of, and satisfactorily answered.¹¹ But then, when any Exceptions can justly be made, and there is good Reason for differing from the Author’s Opinion in any Point, the Reasons are given for so doing in some Notes at the Bottom of the Page;¹² which Notes, however, are neither many nor long, since it would be very absurd to run into Prolixity in Comments to a Work where Brevity is principally aim’d at; into which therefore nothing ought to be admitted, but what is essentially and absolutely necessary to the Subject treated of. And on this Account also it is, that whereas the same Matters have, in the former Editions, been found to occur in more than one Place, in this Edition such superfluous Repetitions have been par’d